Don't you think barcode must be black ???

In fact, you can use various colors of barcode to match your cheerful designs of seals, packages, etc.

According to the beam of light,
color images look differently

[1] The Seven Dwarfs below is the image seen under the natural light.

[2] Under 630-nanometer red laser beam (or red light of the light-emitting diode), it looks like the image below.

[3] Removing the red from this image, it seems like below.

Look at the color of Dwarf's hat of image [1] and [3].

In image [1], colors of red/orange/yellow hats are completely reflected under the red light. In [3], they are turned white.

On the other side, purple and green hats seem black because the light is absorbed.

When the barcode scanner reads the bars with its red beam, everything turns into monochrome like that.

That's why, the basic color (usually in white) can be any other colors that reflect red light (eg. red, yellow); the bar color (usually black) can be anything that absorb the red.

Please profit by this principle for your cheerful design.

Barcode Color Finder

To facilitate the distinction between the colors usable for base and those for bars, we developed Barcode Color Finder.

Please download Barcode Color Finder from below and open it by Adobe Illustrator (Version 5.5 or later.)

Download Barcode Color Finder for Macintosh

Download Barcode Color Finder for Windows

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How to use Barcode Color Finder

(1) Make an object (a rectangle, for example) painted by the color that you want to use, outside of the Red Filter.

You can consult a color sample card (of DIC, TOYO, etc.) which describes YMCK ratio of colors.

(2) Drop this color into the Red Filter.

(3) Mix this color and the Red Filter by the operation below:

• If your Illustrator is version 5.5 ...
  Filter --> Path Finder --> Mix Strong Filter

• If your Illustrator is up to version 8 ...
  Object --> Path Finder --> Dark Color Mix

• If your Illustrator is version 9 ...
  Color Pallet --> Option --> Transparent --> Multiply

The result is the color which will appear under the red light.

(4) Drag this color and compare it with the vertical color scale on the left side.

The reflection densities in this scale are made at A/0.0, B/0.1, C/0.2, D/0.3, E/0.56, F/0.82, G/1.08, H/1.34, I/1.6 respectively.

When you drag the color onto the scale, you'll find a color which looks almost same density as your color. That shows the reflection density of your color.

(5) How to judge usability of color

• When the basic color is white ...
  You can use colors from [F] to [I] for bars.

• When the bar color is black ...
  You can use colors from [A] to [D] for the base.

• When you want to mix basic/bar colors ...
  If bar's color is 5 letters or more later than your desired basic color, you can use this combination.
  eg.) In case the basic color is [B], bar color must be between [G] and [I].

Attention!!

The colors you've found must be used as "paper color" or "spot color". Be careful: you cannot use "process color" for this purpose.

* You cannot use gold, silver or pearl for base nor the bars.